Day 7 of the iLock farce. It seems the safest bet is to stay clear of the site until
things are sorted out. I want to make a purchase of an iLock protected product but I
assume that's out of the question at the moment. Has anybody managed to authorise a
product in the last 7 days?

BTW I assume this is the end of iLock as an
authorising method, which I guess is no bad thing.

I dont think its the end of iLok at all. It's a glitch in what is still the best way of
copy protecting plug ins. The SSL thing is so bad that I can't even get the duende strip
to work, and the Plug In Alliance stuff I have is still not up and running after I
installed a new OS drive. iLok is good. For whatever reason they made a mess of this
overhaul, but obviously these things happen. The licenses are not lost.

Hey I completely agree that this thing has been a major disaster for some users and I
think PACE would be the first to admit that they got that wrong. In fact they have done
just that. But until someone presents a better alternative iLok is going nowhere. We've
all used it for a long time with few problems and a lot of added convenience in terms of
being able to take our licenses around with us from studio to studio. Sure, people
complain about it but that's normally because they don't like having to pay for the iLok
itself.

I think a more significant issue with this form of copy protection is
the potential for performance problems which occur as the software polls the key for
licenses in use.

Whatever, we have little grounds for complaint in general (vs
this specific situation in which we have a lot of grounds for complaint of course) because
this is a situation of our own making.

Ha, I was just about to post that....yes...that was the one....text here:

Dear
iLok User Community,

We have let you down and we know it. We could have done a
better job communicating that we were hard at work to fix the issues some of you have been
having and for that we are truly sorry.

We handle tens of millions of
licences for users, some stretching back over a decade with legacy code. Whilst we have
worked to ensure a seamless transition, some issues occurred.

We are currently
finishing the data migration to address each of the affected licenses. This should totally
complete in the next three hours. The data change will happen in the background, and the
resolution may not happen for each license in your account at the same time. It is a
“first in - first out” change, so older licenses across all iLok accounts will be
finished prior to newer ones. By the time you receive this, your licenses may already be
fully migrated.

The following are updated steps for solving the temporary
license issue:

Steps you need to take once you see the license type of
“License” instead of “Temporary”:

If your iLok with the license had not
been seen by the server, just the updating of the database record for your license will
take care of the issue.If your iLok had been seen by our server and your license is
no longer working, please plug in the iLok and deactivate each of the affected licenses.
To do this, open the Detail pane, then select the license from the license grid at the
top. Choose the Deactivate link. Once the licenses are deactivated, you may then activate
it to any allowed location.If you are still experiencing difficulties please use
this link to contact us and we will work with you to fix your issues. We are monitoring
our support tickets closely during extra long hours to right matters.

The past problems I've had with iLok make me paranoid about letting anything near it. It's
a major reason why I refuse to upgrade Pro Tools unless I absolutely must - and it stops
me from trying out any demos that require iLok.

Just a little update on this...I found myself forced to install the new manager and update
a license today. After much trepidation I went ahead and did it, figuring that the worst
that could happen would be a holiday. It did in fact work perfectly and everything SEEMS
normal. Of course I can't vouch that other people would have the same result. Now I just
need to work out exactly what percentage disappointed I am.

Yes, and it's bad. It is also easily foreseeable that all that
high-tech interconnectivity, surveillance and attitude of "if in doubt, distrust
everybody", will bite us in the ****, eventually. It will happen.

What can one
do? Little steps to disentangle oneself. Not a penny anymore to that iLok racket.

The
past week has been one of the hardest weeks of my entire life. As I read through this
thread, it honestly pains me that our mistakes have caused so much frustration and
interrupted workflow. I haven’t been able to sleep and can barely eat. I know I should
have addressed you all sooner, but I feel such shame for how this new launch has been
executed, that I've been focusing our efforts on getting to a resolution, so you can all
get back to work. I've never been in a situation like this and I realize our customer
relations skills have been severely lacking. If you read on, you will see how I plan to
change this.

I started PACE because I am passionate about technology. I know
the amount of work that guys like Michael Carnes and Steven Slate go through to develop
software products and I truly believe that these software products need to be protected
from piracy. PACE has had a long run without many hiccups, which is something rare for any
technology company.

That is why this past Monday I was shocked to see that the
software that we at PACE have all been working on so hard for the past few years was
launched with such unexpected technical errors… errors that have caused some users like
you to be troubleshooting rather than working. I cannot tell you how upsetting that is to
our entire team.

Even though its introduction has been rough, I am still very
proud of the new iLok License Manager. The sole purpose of our new product is to make the
iLok system better for you, the customer. We will get it working. We will make this right.
We will prove to you that we are good people, honest people, with a good product that has
the best intentions: to protect your investment and to protect the software industry's
hard work.

Although our support team is working around the clock, I plan to
improve our customer support so we can help you more effectively. We're going to update
our website with more information and alert new users of the potential problems…
something we should have done earlier. I was just optimistic that we'd have a solution
earlier, but this was a mistake and I'm truly sorry.

We will continue to work
with customers to solve issues they have had with the new iLok License Manager. We will
maintain a presence here and post updates of our progress.

Once again, we
realize we have let you down. The best thing we can do at this point is continue to focus
our efforts on solving any outstanding problems to make sure our customers are up and
running. You are going to see some big changes at PACE.

Oh, how I wish for the day when we make companies like PACE redundant. That will be the
the day when people respect each others' creative input to the commons. And the creators
can still make a living. When piracy is no more.

The past week has been
one of the hardest weeks of my entire life. As I read through this thread, it honestly
pains me that our mistakes have caused so much frustration and interrupted workflow. I
haven’t been able to sleep and can barely eat. I know I should have addressed you all
sooner, but I feel such shame for how this new launch has been executed, that I've been
focusing our efforts on getting to a resolution, so you can all get back to work. I've
never been in a situation like this and I realize our customer relations skills have been
severely lacking. If you read on, you will see how I plan to change this.

I
started PACE because I am passionate about technology. I know the amount of work that guys
like Michael Carnes and Steven Slate go through to develop software products and I truly
believe that these software products need to be protected from piracy. PACE has had a long
run without many hiccups, which is something rare for any technology company.

That is why this past Monday I was shocked to see that the software that we at PACE have
all been working on so hard for the past few years was launched with such unexpected
technical errors… errors that have caused some users like you to be troubleshooting
rather than working. I cannot tell you how upsetting that is to our entire team.

Even though its introduction has been rough, I am still very proud of the new iLok
License Manager. The sole purpose of our new product is to make the iLok system better for
you, the customer. We will get it working. We will make this right. We will prove to you
that we are good people, honest people, with a good product that has the best intentions:
to protect your investment and to protect the software industry's hard work.

Although our support team is working around the clock, I plan to improve our customer
support so we can help you more effectively. We're going to update our website with more
information and alert new users of the potential problems… something we should have done
earlier. I was just optimistic that we'd have a solution earlier, but this was a mistake
and I'm truly sorry.

We will continue to work with customers to solve issues
they have had with the new iLok License Manager. We will maintain a presence here and post
updates of our progress.

Once again, we realize we have let you down. The best
thing we can do at this point is continue to focus our efforts on solving any outstanding
problems to make sure our customers are up and running. You are going to see some big
changes at PACE.

Actually I can say the
same, and have been using Syncrosoft since they moved over from the Printer Port dongle
and apart from a few 'no licenses found' squeaky bottom times when transferring licenses
from one dongle to another, all has been fine.

On one occasion I nearly
goofed. I used one of those PCI cards that added further USB slots including two inside
the PC case. I though hmmm, good idea, I'll plug my dongles into those inside slots so
they are not sticking out asking to be snapped off.

I scrapped the PC but
just before I was to put it in the car boot and take it to the city dump I thought I'll
take the c:drive out, could come in handy, and then - staring me in the face were the 2
dongles!!!! Goodness me, they could have been on their way to the scrap heap!!

On one occasion I nearly goofed. I used one of those PCI cards
that added further USB slots including two inside the PC case. I though hmmm, good idea,
I'll plug my dongles into those inside slots so they are not sticking out asking to be
snapped off.

I scrapped the PC but just before I was to put it in the car boot
and take it to the city dump I thought I'll take the c:drive out, could come in handy, and
then - staring me in the face were the 2 dongles!!!! Goodness me, they could have been on
their way to the scrap heap!!

It seems
many people are finding the iLok upgrade process surrenders existing PT10 licenses (so you
can no longer use your existing PT10) and doesn't complete the new PT11 license (so you
can't use your new PT11 either). Nuking all your ability to run ProTools at all... ouch!

Well, I don't know about you guys, but after having followed the saga in some detail,
Pace/iLok is not a something I will ever have faith in again. The technology is evidently
unreliable and "Zero Downtime" means nothing of the sort in the event of their servers
going down. The way they run their business turns out to be rather unconscionable.

I had my protools completely locked out - I think the issue could be that ilok software
didn't play nice with bundles as PT10 and PT11 form part of the same bundle (in ilok
speak)

I have 2 user cases in with PACE and haven't had any specific advice
other than try again and follow the guidelines. That's what I did do which caused all the
problems in the first place.

Using time machine I wound my mac back to 3 days
before I installed the ilok software and was able to get PT up and running again, my issue
now is not being able to load anything new

I also have AVID support as my PT10
is less than 1 month old - they have sent me a few emails but again haven't really
addressed the actual issues.

Having support hasn't helped any. I kind of felt
on my own with this and that is part of the issue

I would hazard a guess that
real money lost to date due to these issues is in the hundreds of thousands worldwide. It
is a terrible shame as software developers are so dependent on this and therefore so are
we as users. We are the ones paying for our software and we get hit hardest.

The past week has been
one of the hardest weeks of my entire life. As I read through this thread, it honestly
pains me that our mistakes have caused so much frustration and interrupted workflow. I
haven’t been able to sleep and can barely eat. I know I should have addressed you all
sooner, but I feel such shame for how this new launch has been executed, that I've been
focusing our efforts on getting to a resolution, so you can all get back to work. I've
never been in a situation like this and I realize our customer relations skills have been
severely lacking. If you read on, you will see how I plan to change this.

I
started PACE because I am passionate about technology. I know the amount of work that guys
like Michael Carnes and Steven Slate go through to develop software products and I truly
believe that these software products need to be protected from piracy. PACE has had a long
run without many hiccups, which is something rare for any technology company.

That is why this past Monday I was shocked to see that the software that we at PACE have
all been working on so hard for the past few years was launched with such unexpected
technical errors… errors that have caused some users like you to be troubleshooting
rather than working. I cannot tell you how upsetting that is to our entire team.

Even though its introduction has been rough, I am still very proud of the new iLok
License Manager. The sole purpose of our new product is to make the iLok system better for
you, the customer. We will get it working. We will make this right. We will prove to you
that we are good people, honest people, with a good product that has the best intentions:
to protect your investment and to protect the software industry's hard work.

Although our support team is working around the clock, I plan to improve our customer
support so we can help you more effectively. We're going to update our website with more
information and alert new users of the potential problems… something we should have done
earlier. I was just optimistic that we'd have a solution earlier, but this was a mistake
and I'm truly sorry.

We will continue to work with customers to solve issues
they have had with the new iLok License Manager. We will maintain a presence here and post
updates of our progress.

Once again, we realize we have let you down. The best
thing we can do at this point is continue to focus our efforts on solving any outstanding
problems to make sure our customers are up and running. You are going to see some big
changes at PACE.

Okay, so I will stay in "wait and see" mode for the time being. I'm lucky I work at a
university, I can tell students and faculty to leave me alone while I sort out my issues.
I can't imagine what the television guys are doing without working pro tools.

The only plug I'm truly missing is the Izotope RX2. Is there an affordable non-ilok
noise reduction plugin? I can get by with the built in Cubase and Soundforge plugins,
though switching between applications is rather annoying.